The MeidasTouch Podcast - Trump’s Awful Scheme against Minnesota Finally Exposed

Episode Date: January 6, 2026

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas discusses Trump’s scheme to attack the Somali population of Minnesota to distract from his failures before the midterms. Visit https://meidasplus.com for more! Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af MissTrial: https://meidasnews.com/tag/miss-trial The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Coalition of the Sane: https://meidasnews.com/tag/coalition-of-the-sane Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Gofundme.com. This is a commercial message brought to you by GofundMe. Let's debunk and expose what's really going to be. going on here as Donald Trump and MAGA are attacking the entire Somalian population in Minnesota and in the United States, just as they attacked the Haitian population in Springfield, Ohio, and throughout the United States during the 2024 election lying and saying they're eating the cats and they're eating the dogs and we need to stop them. They're doing something similar now with the Somali population.

the 2026 midterms. So Trump and MAGA are trying to, as you know, cover up the Epstein sex trafficking ring. They're covering up a child sex trafficking ring right now at the highest levels of our government. To cover up the cover up, they need a distraction. Also, Donald Trump promised that he would make things affordable on day one. Things are less affordable right now. So they need a distraction from that as well. They don't want to who attack the Latino community, which ICE and the Border Patrol are already doing, sending them to concentration camps and separating families. But as part of the public PR campaign, they don't want to do that because they need the Latino

vote going into the midterms. And their approval amongst the Latino votes right now, voters, is in like the 20s or the low 30s right now. So they're trying to pick on a group, so they're picking on the Somalian population, they're picking on them in Minnesota, Governor Wall. They've identified as a good target. They send this YouTuber guy, Shirley, Nick Shirley, into Minnesota

to concoct this video with the MAGA Republicans in the Minnesota legislature as part of a broader attack on Minnesota Democrats and Democrats generally, and they go after the entire Somali population. So let's just talk about what went down in Minnesota to begin with. So the master. mind of this fraud ring is a white lady who was convicted in March. She was arrested a few years before that.

Her name is Amy Bach. Here's a photo of that right here. On this polymarket account, they go breaking. Convicted fraudster Amy Bach listed as the person of contact for at least 47 taxpayer-funded child cares in Minnesota per official state records. yeah there's not a conspiracy there the Biden administration prosecuted her the DOJ brought charges against her her trial was held back in March where she was convicted but all this stuff was known there were lots of reports on this stuff going back sometime I mean in the 2022 2020 23 24 there were reports on this this is not something that just developed this is not something that just developed this is not something that is, you know, all of a sudden that is new. So you go through, who is Amy Bach?

Amy Bach is a Minnesota resident. She's convicted as the ringleader of one of the largest COVID-19 relief fraud schemes in U.S. history. She founded this nonprofit feeding our future in 2016. She served as its executive director. There's something called a federal child nutrition program that's administered through the Minnesota Department of Education to reimburse meal sites for feeding children. Then there were red flags that appeared in this program.

And it turns out that they were seeking at least $250 million in reimbursements while providing few or no actual meals. Prosecutors ultimately demonstrated that Bach and co-conspirators, and she often used a group of co-conspirators who happened to be Somali. but she was the ringleader of all of this. They submitted fake invoices, attendance rosters, and documentations. Funds were laundered through different shell companies.

And in 2022, federal charges were filed against 78 individuals. So it was initially 47, but that grew over time. Yes, there were defendants who were Somali Americans. Bach, a white lady, was identified as the mastermind. She also faced accusations, that she used threats, intimidation, racism, coercion against an immigrant population to coerce them to be part of this scheme. And she was convicted in March of 2025. So all this stuff has been

covered before. CNN covered it in 2022, again October 4th, 2025. Adam Carlson points out, Washington Post covered it in 2022. Again, December 19, 2025. Minneapolis Star Tribune has a been covering this story continuously since the story first broke in 2022. This is something again that has been well known. So when the DOJ posted the following, Attorney General Pam Bondi goes, this was four days ago. Minnesota fraud. Nick Shirley, that's that YouTuber. His work has helped show Americans this scale of fraud and Tim Walls is Minnesota. There's a fact check of that on X, which was formerly Twitter, the Biden DOJ filed charges

against members of the Somali community and the ringleader, the white lady, Amy Bach, for their role in a $250 million feeding our future fraud scam. 78 people have been indicted. 57 people have been convicted. Seven are in prison and the rest are awaiting sentencing right now.

So in the Department of Justice is like, we did this, we did that. It's the Biden D.O. that did the vast majority of this. Okay, so that brings us to who is Nick Shirley. Nick Shirley is this YouTuber, right-wing, MAGA guy. He's kind of a useful idiot and prop of MAGA, and he's done this before. He's pushed Donald Trump's anti-immigrant agenda.

And one of the things that we learned, and Andrew Mercado points it out, and others pointed it out, and the NPR News, local minister, News pointed out that the Minnesota House GOP leader Lisa DeMuth acknowledged the Republican Party's involvement in Nick Shirley's viral daycare video saying, we, the Republican Party, the MAGAS, worked with Nick Shirley on this. That matters, as Andrew Mercado writes, because the video has been widely framed as independent citizen journalism. Minnesota officials have said fraud investigations were already underway long before the video and inspection. have not backed up many of the claims made about these specific daycare centers shown.

So what Nick Shirley would do is he would show up during the holidays and nobody would be there. He'd show up after hours or before hours when the daycare isn't open and he would hide the signs showing when the daycare was open and closed or that it was a holiday. Or he would just be genuinely creepy. I mean, first off, he would show up with a group of other guys who looked like ICE agents. And so the Somali population, which was already under attack by ice, would be afraid to open up the door for this guy and ice. And also, it's pretty creepy that a guy is saying, I want to see the kids. Can I see the kids?

Let me see the children. I want to see the children. Yeah, daycare centers aren't going to open up for someone saying, let me see the children. And Nick Shirley's like, well, why didn't they put me in a waiting area? Why didn't they put me in the lobby area? I want to be in the lobby area. As Andrew Mercado writes, still the video fueled widespread outrage and targeted scrutiny of a Somalione child care providers. With a top Republican now on record confirming coordination, this reframes the entire narrative.

This wasn't just a lone YouTuber uncovering something new. A political party acknowledges involvement in producing or shaping media that went viral, not organically, and help drive public backlash. And then they had Elon Musk and J.D. Vans and their whole right-wing maga machine amplify all of this. So now let me show you a few things right here. I'll show you this clip right here. This is of Nick Shirley. And as Keith Edwards and says, wow, this guy is a literal idiot. Here, watch this.

Did you come during their normal operating hours when you came to visit? I came at 11 a.m., I believe. and I also came the following day later in the day. The point of it is not whether or not I came at the right time of their operation hours. The point is that blacked outdoors, they can't give you any information. You call that number, no one answers. I wasn't trying to go inside. And there should be a way for somebody to actually be able to call that number and somebody

to be able to answer. These aren't real businesses. But surely you don't think a daycare should just be unlocked. You shouldn't be able to just walk into a daycare. It should be a reception. No. Every daycare is locked. And so, okay, you bring you a fair point, then why can't they actually give me information how to enroll?

Take a look at what CBS News Minnesota said about this. And as Adam Mockler says, CBS News, Minnesota blows open Nick Shirley's fraud story by showing security camera footage of children there. The same day Shirley was there. And he just showed up at times where the kids weren't there. Here, play this clip. This is ABC Learning Center in Minneapolis. They have to learn ABC numbers. Director Ahmed Hassan gave WCCO a tour

after finding his daycare in the national spotlight. All right, we've arrived to ABC Learning Center. In a now viral video, right-wing YouTuber Nick Shirley claims nearly a dozen daycare centers in Minnesota are taking public funds but not providing a service. He says ABC Learning Center is one of them, knocking on the door in mid-December. I would like to check a child in the daycare.

Hassan says his employee didn't respond because Shirley was in a group of about eight people and his staff were concerned about recent ice activity. Is this daycare committing fraud? No, no, no, we're not committing proud. Hassan showed a security footage from the same day Shirley was here. According to the timestamps in the videos, this woman takes a young child into the center

at around 9 a.m. that day. About three hours before Shirley arrives at the door closer to the street. Within the hour, after Shirley leaves, a woman arrives at the other door with a stroller. A larger family heads inside a few hours later. Tuesday afternoon, WCCO found at least a dozen children at ABC Learning Center, which is licensed with the state. Records show Minnesota officials last visited the daycare in November, noting some corrected and ongoing violations related to day-to-day operations, but no record of fraud.

What did I do? I'm just a typical human being who wants to live and do the right thing. I have kids to feed. Umi Hassan, the daycare's current owner, believes these latest fraud accusations are political. Both Xi and Hassan are Somali Americans. We bear our taxes. We do whatever we can't be a low-obeyed in citizen. At the same time, when one Somali does something wrong,

we all get collective banishment. With Shirley's video now approaching 2.3 million views on YouTube alone, they say they are getting non-stop phone calls harassing them. I was looking for a place for my granddaughter. With many of those calls attached to out-of-state phone numbers. They normally say, knock-knock, we're going to have. Knock, knock, we're going to come. You're going to arrest, you know, something like that.

Hassan says they turned over attendance records to comply with the Department of Homeland Security requests. They're now waiting to hear back. CBS News is reviewing records related to the same daycares. All but two have active licenses. And, Aaron, while the active places have violations related to safety or staff training, there's no recorded evidence.

Here is a longer version of CNN confronting Shirley. Play this clip. We're from CNN. Can we talk to you? This is MAGA YouTuber Nick Shirley, back at a daycare in Minnesota, he alleged was a fraudulent facility in a now viral video. If you are going to say this is a left or right issue, but no, fraud is fraud. I'm not out here trying to put a twist on things. Shirley's viral video released over the weekend in which he says he's uncovering tens of millions of dollars in fraud at Minneapolis daycares run by the Somali community was retweeted by Elon Musk and Vice President J.D. Vance. In the video, Shirley tries to open locked doors and talk to people.

at various daycares he claims are frauds. Did you come during their normal operating hours when you came to visit? I came at 11 a.m., I believe, and I also came the following day later in the day. The point of it is not whether or not I came at the right time of their operation hours. The point is that blacked outdoors, they can't give you any information. You call that number, no one answers. I wasn't trying to go inside.

There should be a way for somebody to actually be able to call that number and somebody to be able to answer. These aren't real businesses. But surely you don't think a number. daycare should just be unlocked. You shouldn't be able to just walk into a daycare. It should be a reception. No. Every daycare is locked. And so, okay, you bring you up her point, then, but why can't they actually give me information how to enroll a child? Federal law enforcement has been investigating fraud in Minnesota for several years. Both Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI director Cash Patel said on social media, they've indicted

dozens of defendants. DHS has posted multiple videos of agents. They say are conducting a massive fraud investigation. Do you think that federal law enforcement hasn't done enough? I mean, they would say, look, these fraud cases have been going on, but they've already done like 80 indictments, the cases have been going on, you know, for years. And why did I show up one day in Minnesota and go to all these daycares, no children? They're receiving millions of dollars. We encourage nearly $100 million, $110 million on fraud in one day.

How do you know that all the allegations that you're making are true? How do I know that they're true? Well, we showed you guys the, we showed you guys what was happening. And then you guys can go ahead and make your own analysis. We're coming here. can make our own analysis. Are you 100% sure you're true? Yeah, I am 100% sure I'm true. CNN is looking into Shirley's claims. Hi, my name's Whitney Wilde. I'm a correspondent for CNN. We reached out to several of the daycares featured in the now viral video. Only one daycare facility

answered and said they are a legitimate business. Have you seen that the videos, you know, purporting that some of these daycares don't have kids inside? Minnesota Republicans say, despite the new focus from the Trump administration, they have been sounding the alarm on fraud, for years. You know, we have talked about fraud. We have gotten stories. We have, we've tried to push this forward every way that we can. At the daycare where Shirley showed back up, a stream of children walk inside. You're saying that this is a fraudulent daycare. There's kids being dropped off right now. Yes. The commissioner of children literally said a week ago, this place was closed. Did you know that? They're showing face right now. A viral video, disputed claims, and their full fallout remains to be seen.

Whitney, you mentioned in your story, there were dozens of convictions going back to 2022. Can you explain what those convictions established? Well, this was really the beginning of this massive fraud case that has now led to more than 50, more than 50 convictions, 56 people at least convicted as of September of this year, Jim. At least 78 people have been indicted in that case. It was this sprawling investigation that, you know, DOJ has really touted as their effort to try to root out what is a fraud problem here in Minnesota, Jim. And then, of course, that many of them did begin a number of years ago. Whitney Wilde, good to have you there. Thanks very much.

Here is Abrahim Ali, manager of Quality Learning Center. Here's what he described. Play this clip. A lot of the journalism that's been going on the last couple of days has been really dishonest. I don't want to point fingers to anybody, but I do feel like, what was done was someone came to our building outside of operating hours when there's a specific side on our door that says our days and our hours he came outside of those hours and then claimed hey they're closed and they're still making money they're using taxpayer money to work and it's like you don't come outside of outside outside of operational hours and then say they're using

taxpayer money that's completely false as you can see we're open mondays through thursdays to the 10 p.m he was here earlier i don't see him right now so it's like Are you trying to record that we're doing fraud or are you trying to put the somebody name and then fraud in the same sentence? That's what really hardest the last couple of days. We're open. We've been open, we've been open for eight, eight and a half years now. We haven't closed once during that very, so I want to touch on that first.

The second thing is, which is kind of laughable, is a sign. We mess up the sign and we pay somebody to do our site. He incorrectly did it. We're having him work on it. We paid him to correct the site. he said it'll be done by this week so by the end of this week our sign will be fine the third thing which is the fraud claim there's no fraud going out whatsoever kids come to us clients come to us their parents come to us they're here daily they leave on time they come on time there's no fraud

going on whatsoever where those claims came from i mean if a group of people that does fraud you don't paint the brush with everyone in that group you don't say hey there's a group of people that are somebody that are doing fraud say hey every single somebody must be part of fraud no or business owners and being a business order is extremely tough trying to raise kids that are not yours that are others is extremely tough as well but then for people to come and go like hey they're not really working they're just taking free money if any else have children here raising children it's not easy trying to trying to help them school work trying to build their manners is not easy work so when somebody comes and does that it's just it's really disheartening in the community

itself as Minnesota as Somalis as people that own this business for eight years now we do nothing but to uplift the community of our children uplift one another uplift now Somalis uplift Somalis to make a better community for all of us so when somebody comes and says hey they're not doing it it's like if you want to came they're operational hours and there's no one here okay you've got a point he came I think it was 11 a.m obviously there's no cars in the parking lot if you look around there's cars now yeah because our employees are here our children right here our clients are here but don't come at 10 a.m.

They're like, hey, their door's not open. Obviously our door's not going to be open at 10 a. We're not open day of them. That's not open day of them. And just so you see how creepy it is with this guy, Nick Shirley, showing up. Yeah, you can see why these child care properties weren't eager to let in some random dude asking,

where are the kids? As Aaron Ruper puts it here, play this clip. We're just wondering where the kids are. And who are you? My name's Nick Shirley. Nick Shirley. Oh, we are from ourselves. Yeah.

Hello, we'd like to ask where the money's going. Look at that. Shut us down. Where are the children at? No children inside of this daycare center. And look, this daycare center right here, no children inside of this daycare center. But between those buildings, over $2.6 million. Want to give a hat tip to this TikToker, Praia existing, who I think does a pretty good breakdown of everything here. as well. Let me show you this clip right here.

So I'm getting a lot of messages about all of this alleged fraud that's happening in Minnesota because it's my home state. The first message I got was from a friend of mine asking me if I'd seen that video that Wackdoodle Nick Shirley did going to that like quick learning center or whatever it's called. And I'm not saying there's not fraud going on in Minnesota. I'm just saying that some of it seems to be from Nick Shirley. So he goes to this learning center. It's a daycare that has taken millions of dollars. He's knocking, nobody's coming to the door. But it would seem that he's actually at the back door. So here he is at the front door.

It's a restaurant called Obby's Kitchen. That Learning Center shut down, due to multiple violations, none of which I don't believe had to do with fraud. But he doesn't tell his followers that it's actually a restaurant. So I got a bunch of messages about that. And then I got this comment on Instagram, which is a bad faith question. This guy is MAGA. And there has been a huge MAGA push to think about Somali people as fraudsters.

Usually what they're referencing is the feeding our future case. And yes, a lot of Somali people were implicated. in that case. But what they conveniently leave out is this woman, Amy Bach. In 2016, she founded the nonprofit feeding our future. And in 2020 is when the fraud began. This was at the beginning of the pandemic. This was during DJT's first term. He completely mishandled the pandemic to the point that he loosened oversight on these kinds of programs, allowing claims to get through unverified. And Feeding Our Future claimed that they were giving thousands of meals to children. And they never did. They pocketed that money. To the tune of

$240 million. In 2022, during Biden's term, Biden's FBI raided the organization, and the organization shut down. There were 78 suspects, Amy Bach, and all of her employees. In March of 2025, 40 of those people, including Amy Bach, were either found guilty or pled guilty. Merrick Garland called it the largest pandemic relief fraud scheme that there ever was, and Biden's administration shut it down. So most of the 78 people who were indicted and the 40 people who were found or pled guilty were Somali, but they were also box employees. She was described as an authoritarian who silenced dissent within her ranks, discouraged scrutiny from state regulators, and cut off people who refused to comply with fudging the numbers. She is the person who created all of this. And now

this has become a huge right-wing talking point because of racism and xenophobia. But no one ever mentions her, the person who created it. Now, there's a ton more to the story, but I know that this guy asked me to cover this, you know, to prove that Somali people are bad. Because that's what this admin wants you to think. The reality is every community has bad actors. That is not an indication of a community as a whole. Unless maybe we're talking about some white women like Amy Bach, who actually was only caught because of Somali whistleblowers. They were the ones who dissented, the ones that Bach iced out.

Anyway, Toulin didn't read. There are bad actors everywhere, but in this case, it was a white woman. And even on state regime media, which calls itself Fox, Leslie Marshall, I think, did an excellent breakdown play this clip. Well, I looked at what he could be doing, and I looked at what he is doing. One of the things that ties his hands is this very legislature that is trying to get him to resign. Interesting, they're not asking for a recall. So when they say the people of Minnesota don't want him, we'll put it to a recall and let the people of Minnesota decide. Todd, love you. Google. If you Google, actually, local Minnesota news outlets have been reporting on this for years.

Speaking of years, during the Biden administration, there were 59 people convicted so far. The ringleader is not Somalian. She's a white woman named Amy Block. She was found guilty on all seven counts that were brought against her. So there are people that are already in prison. And remember, some of these are not DHS or federal-related facilities. Some of these facilities were closed down for other reasons, not even fraud. But back to your question about Tim Walz, he asked the legislature in his state to give him more authority so that he could do more. And they said no. One, two, he also has closed a number of these centers already and not just a fraud. They were investigating them for everything else.

One, for example, on that video that went out, not the one from years ago, the one just recently. They were already closed because they were a bad daycare center. no fraud. They were just not doing a job to take care. He hired outside firms to audit the payments to these organizations. He shut down the housing stabilization entirely, that department entirely. He has hired an overseer for this specifically. And he just, he continues to try and get more, you know, and I don't think honestly, I don't think he should resign. I think he's going to resign. But I do think it's political and Republicans say it's not. One, it's Republicans asking for him to resign. And two, he's less than a year.

from re-election. And this is definitely going to put a ding in a chink in his armor as he runs. Yeah, right. Now, finally, you have James Comer, James Comer House Oversight. And I think he really gives away the game here of what's going on. And he says in this clip, I'm about to show you, he goes, look, people are paying, people hate paying taxes, people are struggling right now. People struggle to buy Christmas presents. People have it rough in the United States right now. But it seems, the Somalis are taking your money and they're the reason why you're suffering. So what this is all basically doing is to distract from the Epstein files, pick a group,

they pick the Somalis, marginalized immigrant population, relatively vulnerable population in Minnesota, tight-knit community, blame the Somalis in general because a small group of people engaged in fraudulent conduct for which they were prosecutions taking place under former President Biden, and this was all well known. Nick Shirley didn't uncover anything new, like this, all this stuff is, is out there. And then blame the fact that, you know, hey, Maga, you want to know why you're suffering, you want to know why you can't afford things, why you can't afford a home, why your life isn't good, why all of Donald Trump's promises haven't come true.

It's the Somalis fault. Blame the Somalis. So then they become the scapegoat for everything. is a thing that's used by authoritarian since the beginning of time. Like, I mean, this is the authoritarian playbook. Divide the people, blame a marginalized group, and while the billionaires plunder, and just convince people that those are the bad guys. Here's what James Comer says.

I do expect him to show up. This is the biggest story in America right now. The mainstream media is finally starting to cover it. They thought it would just be a 24 or 48-hour news cycle, but this is what the American people are interested in. They're outraged. Everyone works hard. They pay taxes.

Everyone hates to pay taxes. We're struggling to paying for Christmas presents and making ends meet at the end of the year. And then you see, with your own eyes, the massive amounts of fraud taking place in Minnesota, and most Americans have enough common sense to know this is probably happening in other states well there you have it folks i hope this was comprehensive and explained everything uh to you hit subscribe let's get to six million thanks for watching love this video support independent media and unlock exclusive content

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